Last time I did a three meetings in one report; this time it’s two meetings in one. Next time I hope to have caught up with myself and might be back to weekly posts.

VF 38 was on 4th December

A few hiccups today because I had to leave the meeting suddenly and, although it continued without me, people in the waiting room had no-one to let them in because there was no co-host. I’ve never looked into having a co-host or helper. We are only a small group but it would still be handy to have someone who can check if anyone’s waiting and admit them. It seems that there were some internet interruptions too but I can’t do much about that. As far as I can tell, once I start a meeting it’ll continue, even if my own internet connection is flaky or drops, until I (as the host) end it. However, if my internet isn’t working before the meeting is started then that’s a problem much less easy to resolve (but not impossible). I have ended up using my phone in the past but when you have to do something urgently knowing that people are waiting the whole thing becomes a bit fraught.

We came out of Lockdown 2 on Wednesday 2nd December and went straight back into Tier 3 but with minor adjustments. This time non-essential shops are able to open, which should make Christmas shopping a bit easier. We still can’t have any visitors in the home or garden but can meet outdoors, e.g. in parks, in groups of up to six. We’ve also been informed, by Boris, that over a five day period at Christmas we’ll be able to relax the rules whatever tier we happen to be in. Three households will be able to spend Christmas together!

Agnes told us that Heaton Norris Park has now installed one of the frogs from Stockport’s 2019 art trail. The giant frogs (approximately three feet tall and almost as wide) were located around the town centre in the summer of 2019. At the end of the ‘installation’ they were auctioned off raising money for Stepping Hill’s Tree House children’s ward. The Friends of Heaton Norris Park were successful in their bid for one of them. I think this calls for a visit to the park to have a look 🙂

VF 39 – 11th December

The 8th of December has been dubbed V Day – not to be confused with D Day or VE Day or VJ Day……. So this is the day the first members of the public received the first vaccination against Covid-19.

Catherine acted as co-host at today’s meeting , which was just as well because I had to dash off suddenly again. I’m glad we’ve now sorted out this particular problem, but there’s still the issue of the quiz, which is screen shared from my laptop, and so didn’t happen today. Catherine and I will put our heads together about this. It’s good to have these challenges! Keeps us on our toes!

Next week will be the last meeting before Christmas. Had we been in the pavilion, we would have had a little Xmas party with mince pies and other goodies. It won’t be the same on Zoom but we’ll give it a go and see how festive we can make it.

Here’s something that has absolutely nothing to do with knitting:

A couple of teddies sitting very uncomfortably in a yucca! One looks a bit bemused as in ‘Oops! How did I end up in here?’ The other one seems to have landed on a flat part of a leaf but his face is squashed. Better a squashed face than a painful landing!

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